Nicknamed Lee-Anderthal by critics, no one thinks leading Reform UK MP Lee Anderson is a wishy-washy liberal.

And on a day trip to northern France’s largest migrant camp yesterday, a party source claimed in advance that Mr Anderson would spark ‘action’ when confronting charity workers who feed and advise thousands of migrants heading for Britain.

‘He’ll be going up to female volunteers in their 20s and say: “Don’t you know what these migrants do to young women like you in England?” I was told.

The reality, at the bigger-than-ever migrant camp beside a flyover at Grande-Synthe, near Dunkirk, was not so blunt.

As we stood beside a burning pile of plastic rubbish, stinking smoke catching in our throats, just inches from occupied tents, Mr Anderson looked briskly tender as he handed a packet of Smints to a ten-year-old boy.

There were gulps from onlookers as the skinny little boy smiled shyly and said: ‘Thank you, please can you put out the fire?’

The flames were burning too fiercely, however. Even Mr Anderson’s burly, eight-strong security team would have been unable to help. It was a relief when a fire engine promptly arrived and started extinguishing the blaze.

Getting rid of the camp itself is trickier.

Sprawling: Reform MP Lee Anderson stands in the ‘town centre’ of the ever-growing camp for migrants near Dunkirk

Offering: Mr Anderson offers mints to a boy living in the squalid camp

Rude: Hassan, from Somalia, threatens security and Mr Anderson at the camp

Mr Anderson had last been there three years ago and noted it had grown significantly. The Mail last visited in April. It has grown since then, too.

Now there are 50 portable toilets in the grubby makeshift ‘town centre’ of a camp of hundreds of tents over acres of copses and waste ground.

Most occupants are young men, but Mr Anderson noted a rising number of women and children, too – with several pushchairs evident. Free food was served yesterday to hundreds in long queues. Stallholders sold more meals, SIM cards, phone chargers, cigarettes, bottles of juice.

And Mr Anderson engaged with anyone who spoke English – including agitated Hassan, 22, from Somalia, who called the politician a ‘motherf*****’.

That was after a gift of two cigarettes from security had calmed him down from threatening to ‘stab’ them as well as ‘kidnap’ the only female member of the Reform group.

‘I’m coming to England,’ he told Mr Anderson after he inquired of his plans. ‘I need to be in UK. I’ve paid €1,200 [£1,000]. I’m going to Scotland – I like it, Edinburgh.

‘I’m not going to be a billionaire, I’m not going to be “big big”, I want a normal life.’

Turning venomous again, and clearly aware the Reform politician does not promote dinghy crossings, Hassan gestured with a mutilated finger lacking a tip as he continued: ‘I don’t like what you are doing.

‘We need food. We don’t eat. You don’t need to eat – you just come with car, you go with car, it’s easy for you.

‘I’m black, I’m different to you.’

Mr Anderson reflected: ‘On a human level, you do feel sorry for this chap. But he’s going to be trouble – and cost us a lot of money.

‘Do we want this sort of person in our country? I don’t want him in my village – most people in our country wouldn’t want him living in an HMO [House in Multiple Occupation] near them.’

Lee Anderson talks to camera as migrant becomes aggressive and tries to stop reform bus from leaving

 Free food was served to hundreds of migrants who stood in long queues at the camp

The Reform UK MP visited the bigger-than-ever migrant camp beside a flyover at Grande-Synthe

A group of young men pictured in the hige migrat camp in northern France

Anderson said the camp had grown significantly since his last visit three years prior

Mr Anderson also found it hard to remonstrate with Amir, 32, who said he had fled violent Iraqi militias, left his wife and children in Istanbul and was now preparing to cross to England.

‘Why doesn’t he stay in France?’ asked Mr Anderson through a translator, a ripped Vietnamese banknote fluttering at their feet. ‘They won’t give me papers,’ said Amir. Then why not stay in Turkey? ‘They accepted my family – they wouldn’t accept me.’

Asked about the danger of the Channel crossing, Amir added: ‘I would rather die in the water than die in Iraq.’

Smints and empathy aside, Mr Anderson was unbending in his belief that the dinghies must be stopped – and blasted the charities supporting the ‘multi-billion pound trade’ centred on migrants.

He spoke just hours after Reform promised its ‘Operation Fortress’ to stop the crossings with a massive Royal Navy force taking dinghy-loads of migrants straight back. France has rejected the plans.

But Reform learned itself yesterday it is not always easy to repel uninvited guests. As the Reform media minibus prepared to leave, a migrant repeatedly tried to step through the open door and join us, saying in Arabic: ‘Take me to London.’

Even those burly security men struggled to dissuade him as he tried again and again. Only swiftly shutting the doors and driving off fast worked.

Not so easy in the middle of the Channel.